


with you, i serve (with you, i fall down)

by apricae



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Brother-Sister Relationships, Clones, Coming of Age, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Protective Siblings, Trans Clone Troopers (Star Wars), Trans Female Character, clone culture, kind of, platonic intimacy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-24
Updated: 2020-10-24
Packaged: 2021-03-08 19:47:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,092
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27181988
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/apricae/pseuds/apricae
Summary: It's a kind of coming-of-age; a trooper's first sentient kill. A harrowing, frightening, painful coming-of-age.Jammer helps his vod'ika through it, as all brothers should.
Relationships: OMC & OFC
Comments: 3
Kudos: 22





	with you, i serve (with you, i fall down)

There’s always something empty about a trooper’s eyes after their first sentient kill. Droids are one thing; they mirror the GAR in an almost-mocking, mechanical way, but they don’t bleed. They have no families, no bonds, no faces. 

They don’t gasp for breath as the blaster bolt sinks through them, tearing through muscle and bone, they don’t stare open-eyed at the dusty sky-

“Hey.”

She evens out her breaths like they’ve been taught, staring at her hands. Her fingers, slim and brown and dextrous, curled around the trigger. They never shake, but now they prickle strangely, her pulse hammering in her palms. 

“Hey. Vod.”

It’s Jammer. He’s yanked his bucket off, leaving his slightly-too-long hair plastered to his forehead in streaks of dyed white and black. Chaya had laughed at him when he showed off the new look, clutching her belly and calling him a badger. 

His eyes have that same hollowness Kebiin knows haunts her mismatched gaze; but Jammer has killed before, he’s three years her senior, he’s learned how to wash off the proverbial bloodstains and keep moving, and, and-

And Kebiin hasn’t.

It’s a rite of passage. Almost. First sentient kill. No two troopers react the same way; some brush it off. Some cry. Some go quiet, or talk, or drink, or sleep. Kebiin can’t quite decide which she’d most like to do yet. She just stares at her hands, at her knees, hunched forward a little bit in the rattling gunship. 

A rustling, the slight plastoid noise of clone armor. 

Jammer looks up at her from where he’s squatted to the floor, resting his elbows on his knees, helmet placed on the dirty durasteel floor. His eyes have always been kinder than most; downturned slightly at the corners, deep and brown and warm. 

“Hey, vod’ika.” _Little sister_ ; the endearment spoken so soft nobody else can hear. “You’ll be fine. I’ll stick with you if you want, once we’re back on board.”

Somehow, Kebiin finds that her voice is stuck somewhere between her chest and her mouth, but she nods, unable to meet Jammer’s steady gaze. The gunship rattles as they leave atmosphere. She closes her eyes.

-

Stitches gives her a once-over and patdown, and exchanges some sort of glance with Jammer over her shoulder. It must mean _something_ , because Jammer beckons and then they’re trudging down hallways to the barracks, the metal humming and creaking and then shuddering as they stretch their way into hyperspace. 

The barracks are quiet. Most of the others went straight towards either the mess hall or the medbay (so many injured, _so many_ , they’ll have to make it, _please_ ) so they’re almost alone apart from a few still sleeping, the lights dimmed until all the shadows are soft and grey. 

Jammer smiles at her. She can’t quite smile back.

It was a gunner. An artilleryman, positioned to fire at her squad where they lay waiting in a half-dug trench, they wouldn’t be able to hit it from that angle, they just _wouldn’t-_ And in a matter of seconds, her aim shifted, her finger curled, and the blast echoed through her bones. 

The gunner toppled sideways off the cannon and died.

Three, maybe four seconds. Enough to end a life. Enough to win a battle. Enough to save her siblings. 

Enough to make Kebiin a killer.

She’s trembling suddenly, almost imperceptibly, but Jammer has seen it before. Many times. He reaches for her, hesitates at the clasps of her armor, but she nods. She doesn’t think she could manage to get it off now, not with such numb hands and a brain full of fog and something warm and painfully sharp fighting its way up her throat.

Jammer takes off her armor, piece by piece, stacks each part neatly and quietly by the bed. Then he takes off his own, piece by piece, neat and tidy and quiet, until suddenly there’s nothing to hide behind, no plastoid to hold her together.

He sits down on her bunk, and she doesn’t so much sit as _fall_ , knees buckling, onto the hard mattress, toppling down and breaking into soft, tearless sobs. Jammer puts his arms around her, safe and warm and strong, squeezes her slightly, and he lets her lean into his side and cry. 

“You’re all right,” he murmurs, “just let it out, Keb'ika. You’re all right now.”

Nothing at all is _all right_ , she doesn’t feel like herself somehow, everything is spinning and difficult and painful and she can’t stop sobbing, but Jammer doesn’t seem to mind. He strokes her back, firm and slow between her shoulder blades, lets her cry and cry into his shoulder until she’s shuddering from it, gasping softly, aching everywhere, sick with pain. 

He keeps repeating it. Over and over, rumbling through her. 

“You’re all right, Keb'ika. It’s okay. It’s okay.”

He doesn’t shush her. Doesn’t try to stop the hurt, doesn’t try to take it away because he can’t. Nobody can. It’s there forever, a burn inside her, but Jammer lets it be, lets her be, lets her hurt, stays with her.

Slowly, slowly, it recedes, leaving Kebiin hollow with cheeks itching from dried tears, her nose still pressed into his shoulder, his hand on the back of her head. 

“I’m okay,” she tries, hoarse and quiet.

“Bantha shit,” Jammer says. “But you will be.”

Her mouth crooks into maybe-a-smile, watery and weak. Jammer seems to sense it, because he pushes her back a bit so he can look at her. 

“You’re still you,” he says, soft and intent. “Still Kebiin in there.” A knuckle gently knocks on her temple, and she squeezes her eyes shut.

Jammer holds the back of her neck and presses their foreheads together, a silent declaration of love and family and loyalty. Her chest hurts, but she leans into it, their breaths synced.

“Want me to comm Pako and Runi? I told them to grab you some extra food.”

“Might be nice,” Kebiin croaks, relieved. Now that the nauseating ache is gone, her stomach is dreadfully empty after several days on minimal rations. “Thanks.”

Jammer stands, ruffles her hair - it’ll need a shave soon. Chaya will offer, inevitably, to do it for her, and Kebiin will accept, and they’ll make fun of Jammer some more, and Chitter will say something ridiculous and Vaar will roll his eyes and they’ll all laugh. Things will go on as they always have in the war. Things will go on.

Jammer, her _ori’vod_ , smiles, drops a kiss to the top of her head.

“Don’t mention it, Keb'ika.”


End file.
